Expat. Living. Observing. Sharing.

Tag Archives: New York

The Huffington Post recently posted a list of America’s Top 10 Rudest Cities, which they gathered from Travel & Leisure Magazine, and surprisingly the #1 choice is Los Angeles. I think most people would have thought New York would be the #1 choice – New Yorkers are known to be a bit rough around the edges, after all. But Los Angeles makes sense to me. Here is a memorable exchange I had with the employee from the car rental agency who happened to be helping me out on a recent trip to Los Angeles:

Me (with a big smile): So do you have any suggestions for a first-time Los Angeles driver?

Employee (with an even bigger smile): Oh yes, if somebody flips you off while you’re driving, just go ahead and do it right back. Just flip them off.

So, I think I’m going to try to follow this “Post one a day” challenge on WordPress – for no other reason than to see if my brain can produce an iota of interesting content each day. I think it’ll do me good. It’ll at least help me break away from the monotony of worrying about how clean my house is, and how I need to vacuum, and lord, the coffee table needs dusting…yeah, a break from that would do me good.

Anyways, back in early December, while I was still in California, I was perusing Time Magazine while waiting at the doctor’s office whereupon I ran into a rather disturbing quote from a man named Carlos Flores. It left such an impression on me that I ripped the page from the magazine and carried it with me all the way back to Greece.

Here is Carlos’ quote: “I was thinking, If he gets hit, I can’t go to work. It’s Sunday. I can’t miss out. It’s a time-and-a-half day.”

To make this quote a little clearer to all of you, dear old Carlos (who is a New Yorker) said this in regards to him jumping onto the subway tracks to save a man who had fainted. So Carlos saved a man on the train tracks…NOT to save a human life…but to prevent himself from missing his Sunday pay.

What is this world coming to? Are people completely void of any inkling of humanity within their souls? Who goes through life with this type of mindset? The idea that a person in this situation would think of money first just baffles me. On the other hand, poor old Carlos may be working his ass off to feed his family and barely making ends meet. The only humanity he has left is reserved for a special few. Or Carlos could be a complete jackass. Whatever the case is, the question still remains: did Carlos manage to work on that fateful Sunday?